JUL 31, neologism (personal): awarassment

(Ed. Note:) To make this effort easier, we have now collected these neologistic verses in a collection on our parent blog "Edifying Nonsense";  click HERE.

 

JUL 30, Toronto ravines: Cedarvale Ravine

 

If you are interested in winding your way through an encyclopedic collection of four blogposts stuffed with photo-collages on Toronto ravines, click HERE.

JUL 29, anagram swarm: A-VERY-STABLE-GENIUS, #15

You can review an amazing number of anagrams based on this book title on our full-service blog 'Edifying Nonsense'. There are two posts to view: 

 

'A Very Stable Genius': Theme and Variations (97 anagrams),   and 

'A Very Stable Genius': additional funky anagrams.

JUL 28, insects: insect repellents (DEET)

 

Authors' Note: The full name of the chemical is N,N-diethyl-meta-toluamide.

You can review Giorgio's other verses about pesty and occasionally beneficial insects, as  collected in 'Buzzwords: Verses about Insects' on the full-service blog "Edifying Nonsense". Click HERE.

JUL 27, anagram swarm: A-VERY-STABLE-GENIUS, #14

You can review an amazing number of anagrams based on this book title on our full-service blog 'Edifying Nonsense'. There are two posts to view:  ’A Very Stable Genius': Theme and Variations (97 anagrams), and 

'A Very Stable Genius': additional funky anagrams

JUL 26, magical canal palindromes: more far-flung venues

 

You can become an expert fan of our wordplay concoction 'magical palindromes' by reviewing the explanatory material found in ancient days on our full-service blog "Edifying Nonsense" HERE; then, you could check how we applied this technique to 'canal palindromes' by viewing this more recent post.

JUL 25, anagram swarm: A-VERY-STABLE-GENIUS, #13

You can review an amazing number of anagrams based on this book title on our full-service blog 'Edifying Nonsense'. There are two posts to view:  ’A Very Stable Genius': Theme and Variations (97 anagrams), and 

'A Very Stable Genius': additional funky anagrams

JUL 24, Ontario nostalgia: Toronto ravines (poem)

Authors' Note:  Glacial can be pronounced with either 2 or 3 syllables. Here, the word has the meaning of 'produced by, or related to a glacier’. 

  Geologists tell us that during the Wisconsin glaciation, the ice-sheet scooped out soft rock and pushed the piled-up debris, sand and gravel, southward towards Lake Iroquois, the precursor of Lake Ontario. Twelve thousand years ago, with the ending of the ice-age, meltwater from the Laurentide Glacier eroded the channels that became the basis of Toronto's system of ravines.

If you are interested in winding your way through an encyclopedic collection of four blogposts stuffed with photo-collages on Toronto ravines, click HERE.

You can review the entire series of illustrated poems about the good old days in Ontario by checking the post 'Ontario Nostalgia' on our full-service blog "Edifying Nonsense". Click HERE. 

JUL 23, anagram swarm: A-VERY-STABLE-GENIUS, #12

Bonus wordplay concoction:

You can review an amazing number of anagrams based on this book title on our full-service blog 'Edifying Nonsense'. There are two posts to view:  ’A Very Stable Genius': Theme and Variations (97 anagrams), and 

'A Very Stable Genius': additional funky anagrams

JUL 22, at heart: myocardial ischemia

Authors' Note: There is variability in patients' response to the development of blockages in the coronary arteries. Part of this is due to the gradual development of collateral arteries or side branches, which may mitigate the effect of the obstructions to produce chronic symptoms or acute severe damage to heart muscle. The net impact on flow can be assessed through imaging showing blood flow to heart muscle at rest and stress, with nuclear or other studies of myocardial perfusion (‘gated SPECT’). 

You can view more poems on this topic by proceeding to "Cardiologic Tracings: AT HEART" (parts #1 and #2) on our full-service blog "Edifying Nonsense". Click HERE!

JUL 21, anagram swarm: A-VERY-STABLE-GENIUS, #11

Bonus wordplay concoction:

You can review an amazing number of anagrams based on this book title on our full-service blog 'Edifying Nonsense'. There are two posts to view:  ’A Very Stable Genius': Theme and Variations (97 anagrams), and 

'A Very Stable Genius': additional funky anagrams

JUL 20, singable satire: Tom Lehrer sings "ALLITERATIVE BINOMIALS #1"

 PARODY SONG-LYRICS

ORIGINAL SONG: "The Elements", Tom Lehrer, 1959.

Occasional binomials show alliteration
(e.g. one and only)

PARODY COMPOSED: Dr. G.H. and Giorgio Coniglio, 2015. This song is the second of nine in the series on Word-Pairs. You can find the links to the lyrics of the previous songs at the bottom of the post. 

EXPLANATION: The current effort involves a linguistic device discussed by Wikipedia as “Siamese twins” or ‘Irreversible Binomials”. These 

phrases include some of the most colorful expressions in English. There are probably a thousand binomial expressions in the English language. To enhance the singability, I have skewed my selection of binomial pairs here, to emphasize those that have alliteration of the 2 elements. 

For  a recently revised discussion of binomials, click HERE; there is also a post that honors our earlier exploration of these intriguing expressions entitled "The Allure of Word-Pairs: Alliterative Binomials (compendium)".

UKULELE and GUITAR-FRIENDLY LINK: Our whole series of songs can be found in a friendly format for ukulele (and guitar)-players on our sister blog  "SILLY SONGS and SATIRE". Click HERE to proceed to this site. 

For house and home, and king and country, love or leave it, bull or bear

And wild and woolly, weeping wailing, whys and wherefores, wash and wear

There’s lend and lease, lewd and lascivious, longitude and latitude

And odds and evens, wax and wane, and hoot and holler, crass and crude.

There’s form and function, farm and factory, and fling and flirta-ation

And feast or famine, rhyme and reason, rest and relaxa-ation 

There’s rough and ready, rags to riches, rock and roll, down and dirty

And dine and dash, and cheque or cash, and foppery and frippery.

There's live and learn, last but not least, and lemon lime, and life and limb

Safe and secure, and search and seizure, signs and symptoms, sink or swim

And sweet and sour, and Stars and Stripes, and sticks and stones, and sights and sounds

And hale and hearty, hot and heavy, birds and bees, and horse and hounds. 

There’s flora fauna, fun and frolic, fin and fur, forgive forget

Over and out, and tots and toddlers, tit for tat, restore reset 

And Jew and Gentile, dribs and drabs, naughty or nice, and juke and jive

And one and only, publish perish, bed and breakfast, drink and drive.

There’s poke and prod, and pen and paper, post and pillar, pig in poke

And rant and rave, and bread and butter, mix and match, and jeer and joke

Hell or high water, rod and reel, gruff grim, footloose and fancy-free,

Deny his due to devil, dos and don'ts, and also deep blue sea.

Nieces and nephews, peas in pod, kit and caboodle, meek and mild

And ghosts and goblins, trick or treat, witches and warlocks, wet and wild

And trials and tribulation, tried and true , thick thin, and tic-tac-toe

And cute and cuddly, fair or foul, and spick and span, and friend or foe.

Note: A second collection of amusing and instructive phrases has been posted  as "More Alliterative Binomials #2".

JUL 19, anagram swarm: A-VERY-STABLE-GENIUS, #9/#10

Bonus wordplay concoction:

You can review an amazing number of anagrams based on this book title on our full-service blog 'Edifying Nonsense'. There are two posts to view:  ’A Very Stable Genius': Theme and Variations (97 anagrams), and 

'A Very Stable Genius': additional funky anagrams

JUL 18, waterfowl: pelicatessen

pelicans strolling after a meal at the 'pelicatessen'

 You can review these illustrated verses in a wider context by proceeding to 'Immersible Verse: Limericks about Waterfowl' on the full-service blog 'Edifying Nonsense'. (Or, if you prefer, you can view them on Facebook in Giorgio's photo-albums). 

Editor's Note re 'The Pelicatessen': After initially using this neologism (word-creation) as a descriptor on the blog "Edifying Nonsense", and misconstruing it as his personal invention, the author became aware, via the internet, that there is a restaurant located at a resort on Bald Head Island, North Carolina with that name. Although that fact is of interest, it is of limited relevance. Seabirds are apparently not served at the establishment, either as customers, or as menu-fare.

JUL 17, poets' corner: inventiveness (palinku, a novel poetic form based on the 'haiku')

 

Authors' Note: The palinku is a recently invented poetic form. Able to boast a length of only three lines, it has like the haiku, its source of inspiration, a demand for terseness, word compression and poignancy. But, moreover, each stanza of three lines must be composed only of words that are part of brief English palindromic words, phrases or short sentences. You can discover examples right here on this blog-site, published since September 2020 on the 17th of each month. With their short length, palinkus can accumulate quickly and there are now over 60 of them. Our original creations of this type are displayed on this blog starting August 2020. The most recent, dealing with the American political situation, can be found HERE. Enjoy!  

JUL 16, bottom line of medical humor: anal fissure

Authors' Note: 'Aneous', a puerile neologism, has been used here to close the verse, as the proper medical term 'anus' may not function appropriately in this instance.     

You can view these informative verses in a wider context by proceeding to the collection 'The BOTTOM LINE of MEDICAL HUMOR' on our full-service blog "Edifying Nonsense". Click HERE!

 

JUL 15, wordplay maps: sister-cities anagrams (28-30)

Keep more to yourself for a while, wash your hands frequently, remember to laugh on occasion, and stay well!

JUL 14, savoir-faire: pied-a-terre

   You can review verses on this topic in a wider context on our full-service blog 'Edifying Nonsense'. Check the post 'Vers Francais: Savoir-Faire' by clicking HERE.